Wheeling register. [volume] (Wheeling, W. Va.) 1878-1935, 1887-12-12

bath, sharpen your wits as keen as scymi
tals, and then take them into this holy
wsr.
1t Is a very short bridge between smil,
a tear, suspension bridge from eve to liy
and 1t Is soon crossed over, and a smile i!
sometimes Just as sacred as tear. Their,
is as much religion, and think little
more, IN spring morning than in q star.
less midnight. Religious work without
any humor or wit in it is banquet with &
side OF beef and that raw, and no condi
ments, and no desert succeeding. People
will not sit down at such banquet. By
all means remove all frivolity and al
pathos and all lightness and all vulgarity
strain them ont through the sieve o.
holy discrimination; but, on the othel
hand, beware of that monster which over
shadows the Christian Church to-day
couventionality, coming up from the Great
Sahara Desert of Ecclesiasticism, having
on its back hump of sanctimonious
gloom, and vehementlS refuse to- swallow
that camel
Oh, how particular a great many people
are about the infnitesimals while they
are quite
RECKLEss ABOUT THE MAGNITUDES.
WHAT did Christ say? Did He not excori
ate the people in His time who were sc
careful to wash their hands before a meal
but did not wash their hearts? 1t is bad
thing to have unclean hands; it is a worse
thing to have an unClean heart How
many people there are in our time who
are very anxious that after their death they
shall be buried with their feet toward the
east, and not at all anxious that during
their whole life they should face in the
right direction so that they shall come up
in the resurrection of the Just whichever
way they are buried. How many there are
chiefly anxious that minister of the Cos
pei shall come in the line of apostolic sue,
cession, not caring 80 much whether he
comes from Apostle Paul or Apostle udas.
| They have a way of measuring gnat until
Il is larger than camel.
Again: My subject photographs all those
who are abhorrent of small sins while
they are reckless in regard to magnificent
thefts You will fiLd many merchant,
who, while he is so careful that he
would not take yard of cloth or a spool OF
cotton from the counter without paying
for it, and who if a bank cashier should
make q mistake and send in roll OF bills
| FIVE dollars too much would dispatch a
messenger in hot haste to return the sur.
plus. yet who will 20 into stock com
| pany in which alter a while he gets con-
| troll of the stock, and then waters the
stock and makes one hundred thousand
dollars He onlv stole one hundred thous.
and dollars by the operation. Many OF
the men of fortune made their wealth in
that way. Que OF those men engaged in
such unrighteOus acts, that evening, the
evening of the very day when he watered
the stock, will find wharf-rat stealing a
newspaper from the basement doorway,
and will 20 out and catch the urChin by
thg collar, and
TWIST THE COLLAR 50 TIGHTLY
the poor fellow cannot say that it was
thirst for knowledge that led him To the
dishonest act, but grip the collar tighter
and tighter, saying, II have been looking
for you long while; you stole my paper
four OF five times, haven't you? you mis-.
erahle wretch" And then the old stock
gambler, with voice they can hear three
blocks, will cry out, "POlice, policer
That same man, the evening of the day
in which he watered the stock, will kneel
wi h his family in prayers and thank God
for the prosperity of the day, then kiss his
children good night with an air which
seems to say, 81 hope you will all grow
up to be "a good as your father" Prisons
for sins inseCtile in size, hut palaces for
cr mes droinedarian. No mercy for sins
au!macule in proportion, but great leni-
encv for maStOdon iuiquity. A poor boy
silly takes from the basket of a market
woman a choke pear-saying some one
else from the chOlera-and you smother
him in the horrible atmosphere of Ray
mond Street Jail or New York Tombs,
while his cousin, who has been skilful
enough to steal fifty thousand dollars
from the city, you will make him candi-
date for the New York Legislature.
There is a great deal of uneasiness and
nervousness now among some people in
our time who have gotten unrighteOus
fortunes, a great deal oil nervousness about
dynamite. tell them that God will put
under ;heir unrighteous fortunes some
thing more explosive thai dynamite, the
earthquake of His omnipOtent indigna.
ton. 1t is time that We learn In America
that sin is not eXCuSable in proportion rs
it declares large dividends and has ont
riders in equipage. Many man is riding
to perditiOn postilien ahead and lackey
behind To steal one copy OF newspaper
is gnat; to steal many thousands of dol
l. IL frnI
dealer who would not consent 10 steal q
basket OF peaches from neighbor's stall,
but
WHO WOULD NOT sCRUPLE
to depress the fruit market; and as long
as Il can remember we have heard every
summer the peach crop of Maryland Is a
failure, and by the time the crop comes in
the Misrepresentation makes a difference
of millions OF dolllrs A man who would
not steal one peach basket steals fifty
thousand peach baskets. Go down in the
SIMMER time into the Mercantile Library,
in the reading-rooms, and sec the news
paper reports of the crops from all parts Of
the country, and their phraseOl0gy ia very
much the same, and the same man wrote
them, methodically aud UNANIMOUSLY carry
ing out the huge lying about the grain
crop from year to year and for score of
wears. After a while there will be a ''cor-
ner" in the wheat market, and men who
have contempt fOr.petty THEFT will burg
larize the wheat bin of a nation and COM
nit larceny upon the American corn-crib.
And some of the men will sit
in churches and in reformatory institn-
tions trying to strain ont the small gnats
Of scoundrelism, while in their grain ele
vators and their store .houses they are fat
tening huge csmels which they expect
after while to swallow. Society has to
be entirely reconstructed on this subject
We are TO find that a sin is ineXcusable in
proportion as il is great
/ know in our time the tendency is to
charge religious frauds upon good men.
They say, "Oh, what class Of frauds you
have in the Church of God in this day"
and when an elder of church, or dea-
con, or a minister OF the Gospel, or a So
perintendent of aSabbsth-schools turns out
defaulter. what display heads there are
in many of the newspapers! Great primer
type. Five-line plea. Another Saint
Absconded," Clerical Scoundrelism, /"